Kurapika Smiling

One side We have Julia Cameron, a bubbly, jovial and carefree girl who is always smiling and trying to make everyone around her happy. On the flip side We have Liam Black, he's always sitting at the back of the class and doesn't talk or care about anyone. He doesn't have any friends and people leave him alone. That is until Julia comes into his world and forced him to care. Liam finds that Julia is not like everyone around him, she refuses to back down and little by little the ice around his heart starts to melt. And then tragedy struck. Liam and Julia find themselves fighting a foe they can neither see nor touch. Will their love be enough? Will the pain be too much for Liam? Or will love force him to stay by Julia's side forever?

As the upcoming tour approached, the dance troupe suddenly revoked my position as the lead dancer. Anxious to get an explanation in person, I lost my footing due to my distracted state and tumbled down the stairs. While enduring the sharp pain and preparing to call for emergency services, a notification popped up on my phone screen: “Redwood Dance Troupe: Welcome our new lead dancer, Averil Wells, and our generous sponsor, Julian Ford." The accompanying photo featured two smiling faces—my husband of seven years, whom I had secretly married, and his pampered mistress. Julian had his arm wrapped around Averil's waist as he placed a gentle kiss on her cheek. Meanwhile, Averil clung to Julian's neck, her face radiating shyness and delight.

Meet Usha Mehta, sitting there calmly on the wedding stage looking as beautiful as ever in that red sari. But observe clearly her face in all the chaos of the few people running here and there in a hurry to conduct a perfect wedding. Is she smiling happily looking at the wonderful arrangements? No way! Nevertheless, she is taking deep breaths so that she will not strangle the man sitting beside her. So talking about man, let’s see what he is doing. Well, he is also looking handsome but doing the same thing, and that is taking deep breaths not to strangle the girl sitting beside him. They both are looking with wide eyes, imagining the guests saying loudly “You both can’t escape this marriage.” Poor them! Or is it really? Well, we just have only one option and that is to look at their journey from starting.

I’d been dead a month before my family even noticed. It wasn’t concern that brought them to that realization. It was my silence after the so-called “dinner” with Adam Rossi, the infamous mafia boss. My father scoffed like always,“She probably shacked up with that bastard. Too busy spreading her legs to pick up the damn phone.” My sister texted me a photo of them smiling under the Christmas tree, ornaments twinkling like nothing was wrong. Bitch, she wrote. You better talk Mr. Rossi into working with Dad, or you might as well be dead already. And my mother—once the softer one—was now colder than the frost on their windows. “I told you, we should’ve sent Gia to charm Mr. Rossi. Serena always screws things up.” They didn’t think I would die. Not until they found my body—broken, rotten, and forgotten—in Adam Rossi’s basement.

The Devil You Called Grimace. Hunger. Love like a curse. They say some doors open only once. She opened hers with three red candles, a drop of blood, and a whisper. Lonely nights, overdue rent, and a heart too heavy to carry — that’s all it took to call him through. Malik. The man made of smoke, shadow, and everything her prayers forgot to protect her from. He came smiling, with promises sweet as sin — protection, money, revenge. Every favor he gave her tasted like salvation until she realized he was feeding on her, one piece at a time. A memory here. A dream there. Her laughter swallowed whole. Now he’s the warmth in her sheets and the whisper in her nightmares. The devil she named, the lover she can’t unmake. Because Malik wasn’t summoned. He was chosen. And love — the kind that burns red under candlelight — always demands a body to keep it alive.

Three months after fleeing my wedding, I unexpectedly ran into my ex-fiancé at a high-society gathering in the capital. Out of the blue, someone asked me, "Teresa, I saw on social media that you're getting married again?" "Ms. Carter, when can we celebrate your big day?" Smiling confidently, I replied, "Next month." In an instant, everyone began congratulating me and Daniel. After all, everyone knew he had been my fiancé. After the party, Daniel cornered me, his tone sharp. "You're the one who ran away from the wedding, and now you're the one rushing to get married? Do you think this is funny?" I found his reaction amusing. Fixing him with an icy stare, I said with a faint smirk: "Who said my new groom is you?"

My fiancé, Owen Lockhart, came from old money. He kept a canary in a gilded cage, spoiling her rotten. Just as I was about to break off the engagement with him, a barrage of comments suddenly popped up in my mind. [What did Owen do wrong? He just wanted to get your attention.] [Don't break up with him. All you need to do is shed a few tears, and he'll give you everything.] I turned my head, and through the window, I saw the canary in her high-end jewelry, smiling brightly as she hooked her arm around Owen's. He lazily lowered his eyes, yet his expression held a hint of indifference mixed with a subtle affection. I smiled bitterly, replying to the lawyer's message: [Go on with drafting the engagement annulment agreement.]

"Qubool hai(I accept)," I said with great difficulty and a lone tear escaped from my eyes. I looked at my husband and found him smiling at me. His smile was so mysterious and unusual which created a shiver in my whole system. At the time of Rukhsati(sending off the bride), my mother requested to my husband," Please, take care of her." " Don't worry. I will love her and take care of her so much that she will forget her own family," He replied chuckling but I felt something fishy in his voice. Will he really love me and take care of me the way he is promising to my mother? Erina was just a 22-year-old girl when she was forcefully married to a stranger. She is doubtful about this stranger's intention behind marrying her. Will she ever come to know about her stranger husband's intention?

Samantha Granger's daughter, Celine Hamley, was critically ill and urgently needed a bone marrow transplant from her biological father, Calvin Hamley. But the man Celine called Dad was busy building a castle for his first love's daughter and lighting up the entire city with fireworks for her birthday. Samantha made call after call, but when Calvin finally picked up, he said, "I'm busy." Then the phone went dead. In the end, Celine's hand went cold, and she died. Calvin didn't even see her one last time. Samantha walked out of the funeral home with an urn. Every LED screen downtown was playing a birthday celebration video. The three people who had trampled over Celine's life were smiling, singing the birthday song, and dreaming aloud of a beautiful future. Samantha had once loved Calvin with everything she had. Now, she hated him just as much.

Before my crazy grandmother died, she gave me three walnuts. According to her last wish, I cracked open the first walnut on my twenty-fifth birthday. Inside the walnut was a slip of paper. 'Go to the skybridge and grovel at the first beggar you meet' was the instruction written on it. When I looked at the note, I could feel my cheeks burning with embarrassment. Still, I did as told. To my surprise, the beggar turned out to be an undercover cop. Only later did I learn that I had long been targeted by human traffickers, and the bow had saved my life. As for the second walnut, my grandmother told me to crack it open before I got married. When I put on my wedding dress, ready to marry the policeman who saved me, I happily opened it. This time, there was a crumpled old photograph inside. In the photo, my fiancé was smiling as he strangled another bride.